ANC can teach Kenya amateurs

Not wanting to get into a boasting war with some of our friends in Africa, but we do have to say that, when it comes to government wasteful spending and corruption, we have only one message for you people in Kenya: you’re amateurs!

Today, we report about outrage which has flowed around Nairobi and elsewhere about the office of the
deputy president spending the equivalent of R1.3 million on curtains and furniture to the tune of nearly
R1 million.

Here, in the Home of Democracy in Africa, our big spenders (ministers and governmental bigwigs) will
have at least that spent on their official residences.

READ: High-profile ANC members facing the chop from election candidate list?

And, we bet you Kenyans don’t have your VIPs riding around in “blue-light” convoys which are often more
than a dozen vehicles strong…

The Kenyan report comes just as the Sunday Times reported yesterday that our National Assembly Speaker, Nosiviwe Mapisa-Nqakula, has been accused of taking bribes totalling R2.3 million from a South African National Defence Force contractor when she was still the minister of defence.

According to the paper, the cash was handed over in bags on various occasions.

Mapisa-Nqakula said she was unaware of the investigation.

“If that is what you are saying, [that] I am being investigated, I expect that I will be questioned by the
directorate and if I am being charged I will be taken to court. And then I will speak for myself.”

That’s either arrogance or innocence talking there…but whether she will ever be brought to court is debatable, given the lack of progress in holding the king- and queenpins of state capture accountable.

Last week, too, Deputy Minister Dipuo Peters was sent off on a month’s suspension without pay by her
boss, President Cyril Ramaphosa for violations of the ministerial code of ethics so egregious she would
probably have been forced to resign… in Kenya.

NOW READ: Past comes back to haunt Mapisa-Nqakula as speaker investigated for R2.3m bribes